Downton Abbey Spotlights Abortion as Character Makes an Examination of Conscience

SPOILER ALERT: This post discusses the Feb. 9 episode of Season Four.

My husband and I have embarked on a new family tradition: we watch Downton Abbey every Sunday evening unless we have more important plans.

Aside from the costumes and the setting, we love the way the show's creators use seemingly ordinary moments of domestic life to illuminate deeper truths about the healing power of virtues like charity and justice.

Recently, when the plot turned to a positive pregnancy test for Lady Edith, the unmarried daughter who has fallen in love with a married man who has disappeared during a trip to Germany, I wondered how the show would address her problem.

Julian Fellowes, the creator of Downton Abbey is a Catholic, but the show has never served as a vehicle for promoting Catholic teaching on hot-button issues. Rather, I have often discerned a more subtle process of presenting a Catholic vision of community through the' relationships, life choices and obligations of a sundry group of people who call Downton home.

The show, for example, doesn't celebrate the autonomous individual who puts his or her desires ahed of the common good, though it roots for ambitious servants who want to better themselves. When characters act selfishly that fact is duly noted, though often tolerated by a household culture that is patient with human frailty.

As the Feb. 9 episode began, I got my first clue about how the moral dilemma arising from Lady Edith's pregnancy would be addressed. In an early scene, she is preparing to go to London, where she has scheduled an abortion. She is clearly shaken and seeks reassurance from her mother, Lady Grantham, who is unaware of her predicament.

Edith asks her mother, "You don't think I am bad, do you?"

Her mother replies, "Bad? No."

Edith tells her, "Sometimes I have bad feelings."

Her mother draws her close and says, "We all have bad feelings. It's acting on hem that makes you bad."

The exchange, which offers a precise statement about the morality of human action, sets up Lady Edith's painful examination of conscience.

Lady Edith goes to London and soon reveals her pregnancy to her Aunt Rosamund.

"What do you propose to do?" Rosamund asks.

Edith tells her, "it is hard to say the words but I have decided to get rid of it."

She partly justifies her choice by reminding her aunt that if the pregnancy continued, she would become an "outcast."

When pressed to reconsider, Lady Edith acknowledges the horror of her planned action, "I am killing the wanted child of the man I am in love with and you ask me if I have thought about it?"

Further, she admits her dawning sense of guilt, saying that she would no longer go to the nursery at Downton to visit her niece and nephew. Here, she makes no distinction between the life of her unborn child and that of two toddlers who were "wanted."

But when Lady Edith arrives for her appointment at the doctor's office, she hears a patient weeping. The haunting cry echoes the grief of Rachel, who -- we are told in Matthew 2:18 -- is "weeping for her children... because they are no more.”

Edith tells her aunt that she cannot go through with the procedure and literally flies from the doctor's office.

Think back to Lady Grantham's clear-eyed obseration: "We all have bad feelings. It's acting on hem that makes you bad."

So did the Downton Abbey episode take a "pro-life view" of abortion? Some commentators who oppose abortion say it did, while others challenge that judgment.

applying a modern-day debate to Downton’s plot [doesn't] actually make much sense. In the context of the show, the episode isn’t “pro-life” at all.

First of all: The pro-life/pro-choice debate hadn’t crystalized into those terms at the time. But moreover, as Aunt Rosamund is aware, an abortion would have been both illegal and dangerous for Edith. Those were factors any woman would have considered.

...Then there’s the fact that Edith wants to have the baby — if anything, it’s about her choice. In her dialogue, she describes the fetus as a “wanted child”; she always wanted to have the baby, so her decision at the abortionist’s flat is less of a realization about the beauty of motherhood, and more a recalculation of her own strength. A pregnant woman who wants to have a baby deciding to do just that isn’t a statement on either side of the abortion debate.

But why should the morality of abortion only be addressed within a modern "culture wars" framework that focuses on the scoring of political points? Rothman's conclusion ignores more than two thousand years of religious moral teaching that opposed abortion as the unlawful taking of innocent human life. Further, while it may be true that Lady Edith's ultimate decision reveals a "recalculation of her own strength" that fact also illuminates a larger truth: moral choices that respect life empower rather than diminish women.

So, what's next for Lady Edith? If past episodes are any guide, the show's creators will not return again soon to the issue of abortion and the moral dilemma posed by a crisis pregnancy. Rather they will be patient with their characters and with their audience, allowing them time to absorb the lessons learned as Lady Edith fashions a life-giving solution to her predicament.

Comments

Naturally, you have a Catholic interpretation of the past. The character of Edith faces not only C of E and social isolation, Catholics will also shun her. Tom’s character will have a internal conflict if he learns of Edith’s extramarital relations. Edith is making a brave decision because she wants the child—she knows what she’s up against. She is not going to report the doctor to the law, even though abortion is illegal in her era. It’s her personal decision, and one point of the story is that she had a choice, even though it was an illegal one.

Posted by jenny on Saturday, Feb 15, 2014 5:18 PM (EST):

Any reason why men-priests hardly talk about a man decision to kill his unborn baby ?

Posted by icefalcon on Saturday, Feb 15, 2014 1:18 PM (EST):

Re: Ms. Rothman’s TIME comments: Of course the issue of abortion must always be framed in the pro-life context. Acknowledgement that abortion is the taking of a human life has always been at the heart of the issue. Why does Rothman think it was illegal in the first place?

Posted by Tammy on Friday, Feb 14, 2014 3:00 PM (EST):

It would make sense that married women in their 30s - 40s were the majority of those seeking seeking abortions in those days… they were the ones who had 7-12 children already - making life very difficult indeed.

A young, unmarried woman would be on child one or two - and not as distressed about having a child, because children were plentiful. All of this, an episode or two of Call The Midwife portrays very well.

It is easy for our culture to forget how hard it would be to have 10-12 kids in poor conditions… we haven’t seen such a thing for years.
Watching those episodes of Call the Midwife certainly inflicted some conflicted feelings in me - a faithful, devoted Catholic woman—- for those women, for whom having another child really would resemble a burden.
(and the perception of adoption was truly vile)

My cushy modern American life had yet to reveal that to me.

Posted by mrscracker on Friday, Feb 14, 2014 11:57 AM (EST):

Angela,
Yes, I thought “Call the Midwife” was a lovely, family friendly show until a season ago when the plots started getting pretty dark.Plus, here it aired on Sunday evenings which certainly isn’t the most appropriate time to show scenes of kitchen table abortions.I wrote an email to our local PBS station but never heard back.

Posted by Angela on Friday, Feb 14, 2014 1:15 AM (EST):

I was surprised that she did not go through with it. The show has touted ‘modern values’ before such as Barrows ‘coming out’ but not being shunned/arrested. I thought for sure she’d have the abortion and then she’d be pictured as relieved and happy - like that episode in Call the Midwife. Glad DA supported a prolife view.

†
Abortion was evil then and it is evil now. Life is always hard, but when we attempt to escape from the crosses we are given, we will only end up with heavier ones, whether they are obvious or not. This is not fatalism; it is acceptance of God’s will. We can do many legitimate things to minimize suffering, but it is impossible to “right” one wrong with another.
†

Posted by Andy on Thursday, Feb 13, 2014 5:30 PM (EST):

Mrscracker: Fair enough. I’m not going to the mat to defend an English medical journal. *If* what the journal said is true—and I’m inclined to believe the facts as the journal presented them, since these professional journals are usually fact-checked, but that’s me—then it presents an interesting take on the Downton Abbey episode.

Posted by Elisa on Thursday, Feb 13, 2014 3:37 PM (EST):

Ethel was the maid who became pregnant during 2nd season and it showed the consequences. Her storyline continued into the following season. Her time working as Isobel Crawley’s cook/housekeeper helped her get a new job elsewhere.

Good thing her Aunt Rosamund said it was a mistake as they left the doctor’s office.

Posted by mrscracker on Thursday, Feb 13, 2014 2:10 PM (EST):

Andy,
In a professional journal a statement is backed up with citations.In other publications you can get away with that.

Posted by Stephanie on Thursday, Feb 13, 2014 1:29 PM (EST):

Prior to the legalization of abortion, 90% were done at doctor’s offices so I don’t think they were as “dangerous” as some might think. What is dangerous is going to an abortion clinic because they don’t even have to be physicians anymore and they often take their time before calling 911 should something go wrong.

Posted by Andy on Thursday, Feb 13, 2014 1:01 PM (EST):

My sense is that the information you’re wondering about—i.e., married women in their 30s-40s were the ones getting the majority of abortions in England in that time period—may be undisputed in England. They don’t footnote it b/c it’s not a controversial claim. Kind of like the way a U.S. writer wouldn’t footnote that a majority of self-described Catholic women have used birth control at some point in their life; that fact is now beyond dispute as well.

Posted by mrscracker on Thursday, Feb 13, 2014 12:22 PM (EST):

Andy,
Well, the only thing is that you’d kinda expect a medical journal to provide citations when making a rather sweeping comment like that.I’m not aware whether the author’s point is true or untrue, but I think I’d back that up if I were writing an article in a professional journal.He certainly must have access to references he could list.
Anyway, thank you again. It was good reading & I appreciate you sharing that.
God bless!

Posted by Andy on Thursday, Feb 13, 2014 11:31 AM (EST):

Mrscracker: I’m flattered someone actually read a link I posted! Thank you. I agree that the article is not the last word on anything, but I found its counter-intuitive points (i.e., married women were the main abortion seekers, England’s “leadership” in abortion law) interesting.

Posted by Guy McClung on Thursday, Feb 13, 2014 11:28 AM (EST):

Dear Joan, Thank you for this full-of-wonder insight: “a larger truth: moral choices that respect life empower rather than diminish women.” In your free time, please write a book about this. You steal prodeath thunder when you use the word “empower.” You help God throw lighting bolts when you use the word “truth.” Guy McClung, San Antonio

Posted by mrscracker on Thursday, Feb 13, 2014 9:39 AM (EST):

Andy,
That was a very interesting article you provided the link for, but the author didn’t appear to cite any sources for that comment.If he did, I missed that.
Anyway, the article’s info. about how long it took the medical profession to figure out washing hands prevents spread of disease & lowers maternal death was enlightening.I didn’t realize other drs. besides Ignaz Semmelweis had also come to that conclusion.The article failed to mention that some of the contempt Dr. Semmelweis received was fueled by the perception that he was an Hungarian outsider & possibly Jewish in ancestry.

Posted by Andy on Wednesday, Feb 12, 2014 5:12 PM (EST):

NCR readers might be interested in this link (“British maternal mortality in the 19th and early 20th centuries”) from the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1633559/. The authors note that, during this period (which includes the time period DA is set) “it was not mostly unmarried girls in trouble who resorted to abortion, but the 30-40-year-old married women for whom contraception had failed.” The article also notes that in 1938, a British judge ruled in an abortion prosecution of a doctor that “if two doctors were of the opinion that a woman’s health, physical or mental, would be made worse by continuation of pregnancy, they may recommend and perform an abortion.” Lady Edith’s predicament, in other words, is a bit of an outlier: wealthy, unmarried women did not appear to be the prime demographic for abortions in early to mid 20th century England. (Interestingly, when the chamber maid got pregnant back in season one, she didn’t consider abortion at all.)

Posted by mrscracker on Wednesday, Feb 12, 2014 2:48 PM (EST):

Yes, I thought that was very cool.And such a better way of presenting a moral issue than preaching at the audience.
Praise God, perhaps the tide is turning on abortion.I hope so.

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About Joan Desmond

Joan Frawley Desmond, is the Register’s senior editor. She is an award-winning journalist widely published in Catholic, ecumenical and secular media. A graduate of the Pontifical John Paul II Institute for Studies of Marriage and Family, she lives with her family in Menlo Park, Ca, in the San Francisco Archdiocese.